Do governance indicators matter?

1. Do governance indicators matter? Empirics of Governance Seminar Washington 1-2 May 2008 Nils Boesen

2. The point of departure • Governance reforms are painstakingly difficult • Donor support to governance reform has been ineffective • Donor driven reforms • Politically uninformed • Overloaded reform agendas • Ridiculous time horizons • Poor attention to change management & process issues • Can governance indicators help?

3. A superfluous sticker? “If you think there are problems with the data, try without it…” - That has worked quite well for governance development for several hundred years –so what is the new offer?

4. A solution looking for a problem? “‘Governance’ functions as umbrella concept, focusing on factors which are associated with present-day OECD countries.” OECD: Survey of Donor Approaches to Governance Assessment, February 2008

5. Through a looking glass darkly? • Voigt: “Internally vs. externally sanctioned institutions” - “Political institutions determine economic institutions“ • Kaufmann: “What To Measure: Rules or Outcomes?” • Kray: “some areas of governance have particularly clear and unambiguous definitions: “Corruption is the use of public office for private gain”” • Etc: Rule of law, elections, transparency – assuming citizenship rather than sovereign-subject-relationships?

6. Understanding…nothing?? Measuring the difference…? Desired reality Current reality ..or understanding reality…?

7. “Realist” alternatives 1: other data!

8. Realist alternatives 2: Benchmarks within reach Attainable, attractive vision Desired reality Current reality …matching power behind reform, current governance configuration and domestic capacity to change

9. Example: PEFA • 31 potential PEFA “compliance gaps” – where to start? Indicators give no answer – but may add to overload risk • Still risk of solution-driven standards: “PI 12 - Multi-year perspective in fiscal planning, expenditure policy and budgeting” • Legitimacy risk: Mainly donor-developed, donor executed

10. Ways forward – action & research • Specific benchmarks, co-developed with partner countries and the professions (Example: JV Procurement) • Combine “good enough practices” (benchmarks) with “good enough fit” (political economy, sequencing) • Temper beliefs in magic of evidence based and indicator-driven policy approaches – it sells, but not yet much evidence (sic!) that it works.